Republicans — including Tom Kean and Chris Christie — spoke respectfully of the Democratic former governor's lasting impact on the state and its politics.

A memorial service for former Gov. Brendan Byrne at the Paper Mill Playhouse in Millburn on Monday drew former colleagues and adversaries, as well as Gov. Chris Christie and his living predecessors.(Photo: Kevin R. Wexler/NorthJersey.com)

One reason former Gov. Brendan Byrne saved a million acres of acres of boggy wilderness was he believed North Jersey’s strip malls were ugly.

He also hated losing at tennis.

At a funeral service for Byrne in Millburn on Monday, Don Linky, a former top adviser, described how it happened. Byrne’s friend, fellow Princeton alumnus and frequent tennis opponent was John McPhee, a writer whose first book praised the subtle beauty of the Pine Barrens. McPhee described strip malls encroaching on the wilderness from all sides, and predicted in 1968 that “the Pine Barrens are not very likely to be the subject of dramatic decrees or acts of legislation. They seem to be headed slowly toward extinction.”

Byrne's son Tom was one of several speakers who recalled the former governor's wry sense of humor.(Photo: Amy Newman/NorthJersey.com)

All of Byrne’s advisers, including Linky, told the governor this was the wrong fight to pick. Byrne ignored them. Byrne, who was born in West Orange in 1924, lamented the sprawl of suburbia across North Jersey’s farms.

In dramatic fashion, he signed the Pinelands Protection Act in 1979.

“He took on a challenge to prove John McPhee wrong,” Linky said. “He did it all by himself. He knew it would hurt him politically. But he wanted to take risks. He wanted to do big things.”

Byrne died last week at age 93. On Monday, his friends — many of whom started out as enemies — squeezed into the big auditorium at Paper Mill Playhouse to remember a governor unlike any in recent memory. In this era of political brinkmanship, in which Democratic and Republican leaders describe their opponents as mortal threats to the survival of the republic, Byrne, a lifelong Democrat, was eulogized by three Republicans, including the sitting governor of this state.

“He was the only one of my predecessors who used to wander into the office unannounced,” said Gov. Chris Christie, who remembered that Byrne always stopped in front of his own painted portrait, which hung on the wall of the governor’s outer office beside that of his successor, Thomas Kean. “He would say, ‘That damn Kean, he copied everything I did, including getting the same artist that I did.’ ”

It was a funeral service enlivened by the remembered jokes of a funny man. At least three speakers, including Newark Archbishop Joseph W. Tobin, referenced Byrne’s oft-repeated wisecrack that he hoped to be buried in historically corrupt Hudson County so he could remain active in politics.

Gov. Chris Christie, a Republican, recalled a bipartisan kinship with Byrne, a Democrat. “He was the only one of my predecessors who used to wander into the office unannounced,” the governor said of Byrne.(Photo: Amy Newman/NorthJersey.com)

Byrne’s son Tom remembered the time he was serving as chairman of the state Democratic Party, just as Gov. Christie Todd Whitman, a Republican, merged two state agencies to save money and a number of Democrats were indicted for corruption.

His father, the former governor, was not going to let such a prime moment for comedy go to waste, even if it meant embarrassing his son.

“He said, ‘I understand that Governor Whitman plans to combine the Department of Correction and the Democratic Party,’ ” Tom Byrne said during the funeral service. “ 'It may not save any money, but it will save a little time.' ”

Byrne’s jokes were a kind of cover for a mind that mastered political strategy at an early age. Byrne spent 62 of his 93 years at the nexus of power in New Jersey, as either governor or an adviser to governors. He started in 1955 when he became an assistant counsel to Gov. Robert B. Meyner, who later appointed him as the Essex County prosecutor. Later, when Byrne was serving as a Superior Court judge, a mobster described Byrne in a phone conversation that was wiretapped by the FBI as a “Boy Scout” who "couldn’t be bought."

Democratic leaders in the state, eager to capitalize on the Watergate scandal and growing public anger about government corruption, asked Byrne to run for governor. Eventually he agreed to run in 1973, using “The Man Who Couldn’t Be Bought” as his campaign slogan.

His time as governor was tumultuous. During his first term, Byrne persuaded legislators to approve an income tax, earning him a new nickname, “One-term Byrne.” His popularity sank to historic lows, and Byrne considered not even running for re-election, Linky said. It was only the advice of John Degnan, Byrne’s attorney general who served until last year as chairman of the Port Authority, that kept Byrne in politics at all.

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“The one who convinced him to run again was John Degnan, who said, ‘You should stand up for what you believe in,’ ” Linky said.

It was during his second term that Byrne accomplished many of the things for which he is best remembered. In addition to saving the Pinelands, he presided over the addition of an indoor arena to the Meadowlands Sports Complex, the creation of which he had championed in his first term. He also pushed through legislation legalizing gambling in Atlantic City, the first time casinos were allowed in the United States outside Las Vegas, and created NJ Transit.

'A beacon of hope'

He did it all using political skills that even Byrne himself described as modest. Through the end of his first term he was known as a boring, bumbling public speaker, several people at his memorial service remembered. Unlike natural politicians, who never forget a name or a face, Byrne regularly forgot the names of important political allies, Linky said.

“My father’s career was a beacon of hope,” Tom Byrne said during the memorial service. “In his early days, he referred to himself as the oratory equivalent of a blocked punt. Few back then disagreed. So if he could evolve, as he did, surely there is hope.”

Christie, center, and his wife, Mary Pat, with Jon Corzine, the Democrat whom Christie unseated in 2009, at a memorial service for former Gov. Brendan Byrne in Millburn on Monday.(Photo: Amy Newman/NorthJersey.com)

Byrne maintained his reputation as an honest politician right till the end of his final term as governor, when he named the newly built Meadowlands arena after himself. That move did not sit well with voters, Linky said, and as he prepared to leave office, his approval ratings sank again.

“I was against it,” Linky said. “He had an ego. Sometimes a very big ego.”

Yet within a few years as a private citizen, Byrne had rehabilitated his public image. He joined with Kean, his successor, to write a regular column in The Star-Ledger in which they argued about politics. The pair also led a long series of public events in which Kean served as straight man to Byrne’s jokes.

“Let me tell you, taking the stage after Brendan Byrne was no picnic,” Kean said during his eulogy on Monday.

Behind the scenes, Byrne honed his role as the wise, funny and discreet adviser to two generations of New Jersey politicians. At Monday’s service, Kean admitted for the first time that after he and Byrne played their regular afternoon tennis game, he would take a seat beside the former governor and ask him how to deal with a Democratic Legislature.

“The staff didn’t know and neither party knew” about the secret meetings, Kean said. “His friendship at that time, unbeknownst to anybody, was very helpful to me in getting my feet on the ground as governor.”

A member an Air Force honor guard holds an American flag during the playing of taps at the service for Byrne.(Photo: Amy Newman/NorthJersey.com)

Thirty years later, just a few weeks before his death, Byrne offered Christie a similar kindness. It happened last month, during a Christmas party at the governor’s mansion. Christie promised Byrne he would try to do a good job during his final State of the State address, scheduled for Tuesday.

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Members of the Air Force Base Honor Guards fold the American flag for presentation at a memorial service for Governor Brendan Byrne at Paper Mill Playhouse on Monday, January 8, 2018. Amy Newman/NorthJersey.com

Ruthi Byrne, the wife of late NJ Governor Brendan Thomas Byrne, Sr. with her daughter Laura Fromm and Ruthi's son Michael Zinn listen to a speech during a memorial for the late governor at Paper Mill Playhouse on Monday, January 8, 2018. Amy Newman/NorthJersey.com

Brendan Byrne's son, Tom Byrne (left) greets former governor, Thomas Kean at the Paper Mill Playhouse in Millburn. They are shown during a memorial service for former governor Byrne. Monday, January 8, 2018 Kevin R. Wexler/NorthJersey.com

A memorial service for former Gov. Brendan Byrne at the Paper Mill Playhouse in Millburn on Monday drew former colleagues and adversaries, as well as Gov. Chris Christie and his living predecessors. Kevin R. Wexler/NorthJersey.com